Definition of "silence" []

• The condition or quality of being or keeping still and silent. (noun)
• The absence of sound; stillness. (noun)
• A period of time without speech or noise. (noun)
• Refusal or failure to speak out. (noun)
• To make silent or bring to silence: silenced the crowd with a gesture. (verb-transitive)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Now, of these four modes of misleading others by the tongue, when there is a _justa causa_ (supposing there can be such) -- a material lie, that is an untruth which is not a lie, an equivocation, an evasion, and silence, -- First, I have no difficulty whatever in recognizing as allowable the method of _silence_."
• "“The most likely outcome of this silence is a raise,” Chapman writes."
• "To this day, when a glass drops, she's reflexively brought back to what she describes as a "silence of death all around.""